AUBURN — Brothers Scott and Jon Demers have quit their day jobs — they’re all in on building a frozen food empire.

Their Cheating Gourmet brand of appetizers that includes Lobster Crostini and Crab Stuffed Mushrooms has been picked up by 3,000 stores coast to coast, up from 1,000 in 2015.

“This past year has been awesome for me, being able to come in and really build something that is ours,” Jon Demers said. “To see where we can take it every day is pretty exciting.”

Cheating Gourmet headquarters is in an office above Gritty’s on Main Street with 10 employees, not that word’s really gotten out.

“Where we don’t manufacture it here, I don’t think anyone really realizes that it’s our brand and it’s an Auburn-Lewiston company,” Scott Demers said.

The brothers, both Edward Little grads, started their company in 2012 with Crabbies, a frozen food take on their grandmother’s recipe for cheesy crabmeat on English muffins. It was quickly picked up by 500 stores.

By 2014, they had retired Crabbies and developed Lobster Crostini — lobster meat, cheese and spices on a sliced baguette — and had gotten onto freezer shelves in BJ’s Wholesale and Costco.

Scott, now 33, was a mortgage broker. Jon, now 28, was a Lewiston firefighter. Last fall, both left those jobs to grow the company full time.

Scott Demers said they’ve signed 23 new customers this year. Cheating Gourmet is in Hannaford, Shaw’s, Kroger, FredMeyer, Ralphs, Safeway, Stop&Shop and other grocery chains.

“We’ve had a real growth in the retail segment,” he said.

Half of the 3,000 locations stock them year-round; the rest, just for the holidays.

Cheating Gourmet has four core products with Crab Stuffed Mushrooms as its best-seller, Scott Demers said.

Growth has benefited the business and its customers: The shelf price dropped from an average of $9.99 last year to $6.99 this year for the same-size package.

“As we grew, we were able to negotiate better prices,” Scott Demers said. “With higher volume, it becomes more efficient to produce.”

It’s made and packaged in Massachusetts. He said they’re involved in sourcing ingredients, taste and developing new products.

“We’ll actually go down and work at the facility and be hands-on in making sure it translates from small batches to big batches,” he said. “It’s not a perfect science.” 

The brothers have several ideas in the works, including launching a new brand in the spring, Brava Meat Co., and a line of high-quality, lean, frozen burgers.

“Nobody was doing that and that was interesting to us because those are the direct kind of items that I and Jon would be a costumer of — we wanted to bring innovation to the meat category,” Scott Demers said. “We’re upping the game in terms of the gourmet factor, how well they eat, but also the health aspect where they’re not so fattening and so high in calories.”

A good local team of employees has made all that possible.

“We’re still a smaller company and we’re still in growth mode,” Scott Demers said. “The day-to-day changes minute to minute; things pop up. It’s a mixture of reacting to what’s happened but also planning for a couple months down the road. It’s very interesting and there’s a lot of learning on the job still.”

[email protected]